Knight in Rusted Armor
by brighteyedcat
Summary: MiaJane. Takes place while both were students at Lakehurst. Femslash.


i

i.

She had a thing for bad boys. And since nearly everyone at Lakehurst grew up on the wrong side of one track or another, her pickings weren't exactly slim. It allowed her a certain freedom to be choosy, and yet she'd chosen someone that had turned out to be less than subpar…even for her standards. Before Lucas, she was the shy coquette that never dared to stray too far from the straight and narrow. She was one of the few good girls at Lakehurst and because of that, she'd intended to use him as a way of living vicariously; experiencing things she knew would never happen to her otherwise while maintaining her innocence and self-respect. She'd gotten more than what she'd bargained for and nine months later, Mia's once unblemished reputation was tainted darker than oil.

She felt like she was still the same girl, even if it took some extra work and convincing on her part, but no one in that school saw her the same way ever again. Guys came onto her too strong and girls were ruthless in their scathing remarks. For a while, she tried to shrug off their rumors, chalking it up to jealousy or insecurity, but it was useless. Mia absorbed each and every one, letting them slowly poison her soul and crumble her confidence.

ii.

She had always envied Jane from a distance. Rumors circulated the halls about her too, but you would never know it by looking at her. She was so confidently indifferent about everything, which of course meant that deep down, Jane actually cared about _everything_. It was just that over time, Jane had given up on passion because simply not caring was easier. Mia wished she could feign indifference as seamlessly as Jane and she imagined how much easier her life would be if she could just master the art of pretense.

Even though Mia admired Jane's cool lack of concern for anything and everyone, it was Jane who had been hard on Mia since day 1 of her freshman year at Lakehurst and in some ways, Jane was _worse_ than the other girls. Her approach was startling because outward appearances aside, Jane was not known for being a mean girl. She was usually very playfully involved when it came to her tightly knit circle of friends and in some ways, she was the anti-punk punk girl. Her vicious side only seemed to creep out of her when it came to Mia, and when the shit hit the fan about her pregnancy, Jane seemed to practically get off on making the teen mother's life difficult. However, instead of being obnoxiously crude like the other girls, Jane used her clever sarcasm to insult Mia in the most degrading ways imaginable. And yet, the way she spoke to her…or rather, _at_ her, left Mia feeling like she did when she spotted her ideal rebel in the halls between class: anxious, warm, and coy. She knew it was sleazy, but she started to look forward to Jane's insensitive cruelty.

iii.

Before cheerleading practice – the one normal thing in her life – Mia ducked into the women's bathroom to tie her hair back and readjust her skirt that was riding up a little too high. The room was smoky, though that sort of thing wasn't exactly unusual at Lakehurst. The teachers and administrators had more important things to worry about than people smoking in the bathrooms so something like this often went unnoticed. Mia wouldn't have noticed either had it not been Jane that was the one smoking in the corner of the room.

The smoke from her cigarette curled a path up towards the vents as Jane leaned back against the wall with one foot propped up on the smooth bricks behind her. She didn't even acknowledge Mia. She knew she was in the room with her, but she kept her eyes away – looking at the wall beside her, the light fixtures above her, whatever – as she flicked the ashes of her cigarette carelessly to the dingy floors. When she inhaled another toxic dose of smoke into her lungs, Jane turned to Mia and fixated her darkly shadowed eyes on her, almost as if she were breathing in Mia and not the cigarette. It was then that Mia realized that Jane was playing her. Jane knew the kind of guys Mia fell for; everyone knew. And here she was, practically hand-feeding her the same games that Mia fell for over and over again.

Jane flicked the rest of her cigarette into a nearby toilet before walking over to the sinks. She glanced at Mia through their reflections in the mirror and Mia could sense Jane's next callous insult coming on. She almost ached for it like a pitiful dog; anything to kill the silence that was unraveling her rather uncontrollably. She wanted Jane to say something to her face, alone and without the satisfaction of having an audience. But it never came.

Instead, Mia found herself with her back pressed up against a stall door as Jane assaulted every inch of her deceivingly corrupted skin. She tasted as dry as her cigarette, but Mia's voice matched that in volume when her hoarse moans betrayed her nymph-like exterior and better judgment as she begged Jane to be harder, rougher.

She'd always had a thing for troublemakers, but now she had a thing for the rebellious girls too.


End file.
